ALLEGATIONS OF MISCONDUCT AGAINST JUDGES FLOOD NJC

•Body fixes April 24, 25 to examine petitions

Aggrieved litigants from different parts of the country have flooded the National Judicial Council (NJC) with petitions alleging serious judicial misconducts against judges sitting in various courts of records nationwide, Sunday Mirror has reliably gathered.

Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Aloma Mariam Mukhtar, who is worried by the development has already sent queries to some of the affected judges to get their own sides of the case.

A competent source close to NJC who spoke with Sunday Mirror yesterday on condition of anonymity said that the National Judicial Council had already fixed April 24 and 25, this year for its meeting where the petitions and other ancillary matters would be discussed.

The source said that most of the petitions were either alleging outright corruption or abuse of judicial oaths of office against the affected judicial officers.

Although the number of petitions to be treated by the NJC at its meeting is not yet clear as at press time, the NJC source told Sunday Mirror yesterday that the CJN was still adding and removing petitions from the official list of cases to be considered at its meeting.

According to the source, “there is no doubt about it, the CJN is poised to scapegoat some of the judges with dirty records in order to sanitise the judiciary. She is not willing to spare any judge who is corrupt.

But I think she is trying to be careful. She wants to be sure that things are done properly before she makes progress with the cases. I need not say that the Jombo Offo case is still fresh.

She does not want to make any mistake,” the source said. The source also added yesterday that there was an upsurge in the number of petitions being received from litigants against sitting judges since the new CJN resumed office. It claimed that the upsurge was traceable to the determination by the firstever female CJN to cleanse the judiciary of its rot in the next two years.

“The Jombo Ofo case gives a guide. She was the one that nominated her for elevation at the level of the Federal Judicial Serice Commission meeting.

She was also the one who stood up against her immediately she realised the discrepancy in her record,” he added.

Only last Monday, the incumbent CJN, Justice Mukhtar, threatened serving judges fond of writing questionable judgments with serious sanctions.

According to her, “a judge should write judgment in a simple and unambiguous manner such that it leaves no one in doubt as to what the judgement has addressed.

A judgement should meet the justice of the matter or controversies between the contending parties. It is certainly not good for a judgement to be capable of more than one interpretation otherwise the judge would have caused more problem than the reason for his being called upon to intervene in the first place.

“Where therefore a judge is found to be complicit in the writing and delivery of a judgement, the NJC as constitutional regulatory body will not hesitate to wield the big sticks,” she had added.

The NJC is a creation of section 153 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) with power to hire and fire erring judicial officers.

The Council is headed by the Chief Justice of Nigeria although complaints are thickening against the idea of making a serving jurist the head of the all-important Council in view of what happened during the tenure of former CJN, Justice Aloysius Katsina-Alu.

Source: National Mirror